Topic: Mozart operas

[Wendell_E]

Amazing: Callas, Prandelli, Munteanu and Baccalone. Wow !! The only name I know nothing about is Tatiana Menotti (a relation of the composer ?). And of course Perlea was an excellent conductor. Have there been recorded incarnations of those evenings ?

No recordings, unfortunately.

[André]

3 x Martern aller arten on youtube, by Callas and Gencer in Italian ( aka "Tutte le torture") and Schwarzkopf, vintage 1945. Callas has the notes, the charater, the volume. Gencer has the delicacy, the notes, the colours. Schwarzkopf has the gall to attempt it, but fails to convey anything but cautiousness.

[jochanaan]

...polyglot-phony.

Very nice!

[Tsaraslondon]

She actually sang four performances of the complete opera (her only performances in a complete Mozart opera), in Italian, at La Scala, in April 1952:

KONSTANZE MARIA CALLAS Soprano
BLONDE TATIANA MENOTTI Soprano
BELMONTE GIACINTO PRANDELLI Tenore
PEDRILLO PETRE MUNTEANU Tenore
OSMIN SALVATORE BACCALONI Basso baritone
BASSA SELIM NERIO BERNARDI Attore

Maestro concertatore e direttore JONEL PERLEA

This was also the opera's La Scala premiere, believe it or not!

[Tsaraslondon]

3 x Martern aller arten on youtube, by Callas and Gencer in Italian ( aka "Tutte le torture") and Schwarzkopf, vintage 1945. Callas has the notes, the charater, the volume. Gencer has the delicacy, the notes, the colours. Schwarzkopf has the gall to attempt it, but fails to convey anything but cautiousness.

Callas is one of the only singers I know who captures the aria's defiance and the danger of the situation. Edda Moser is another. Sutherland's singing is spectacular, encompassing its technical demands with ease, and her diction (in German) not at all bad (I'm thinking of the version on The Art of the Prima Donna), but I don't get any sense of the aria's meaning or context.

Callas can be heard singing it at a rehearsal for a Dallas inaugural concert in 1958. This was quite an occasion, the chorus joining her for the whole of the Final Scene from Anna Bolena. She also sang Violetta's Ah fors' e lui and Sempre libera, Lady Macbeth's Vieni t'affretta and the Mad Scene from I Puritani. Sounds like the audience certainly got their money's worth!